right? especially today where change can happen, and change is real. >> congrats on the series. >> thank you, man, i appreciate that. >> executive producer dwayne johnson, "soundtracks," songs that defined history starts that defined history starts right now. -- captions by vitac -- www.vitac.com we shall overcome! >> you've got to be crazy. p to think you're going to change the world that way. but he was doing it. >> music was the glue that held everything together. >> the sound track to african-american resistance. >> music is absolutely a vehicle for revolution. >> that kind of courage changed how i viewed human beings. >> we were free, but not equal. >> it's been a long time coming, but tonight change has come to america!

♪ there are songs beyond the sky ♪ >> it's the music that carries our history. it's the music that carries our emotions. it's the music that transports us back. >> tear down this wall! >> this is how we remember history. this is how we put it in context. >> so look at history through the lens of music. it's a powerful way to see the world.

>> i've been hit so many times, i'm immune to it. all right. >> history has made more leaders than leaders have made history. and in this great and very intense need by the black community, a young man emerged by the name of martin luther king. almost as if it was a mandate. >> i think it's one of the most tragic pictures of man's inhumanity that i've ever seen. >> i'm convinced as i stand before you tonight that the system of segregation is on its deathbed, and the only thing i'm certain about is how costly the

segregationists will make the funeral. >> good evening. dr. martin luther king, the apostle of nonviolence was shot to death late today in tennessee. >> he was shot in front of room 306. >> we were getting ready to go to dinner to reverend kyle's house. we were waiting for dr. king to get ready. >> he went upstairs, put on his shirt and tie. when he came out, i suggested that he put on a coat. because it was april, and it was chilly at night. and he just sort of lifted his head as if to say, do i really need a coat? and a shot rang out that clipped the tip of his chin, and severed his spinal cord. so i don't think he even heard it. much less felt it. when i got to him, even though

his pulse was still beating, it was very clear that it was all over. >> dr. king was rushed to st. joseph's hospital emergency room. he died from a gunshot room in the neck. >> it came across the screen that dr. martin luther king has been shot in memphis. and my mother started crying. like a member of our family died. because dr. king in her mind, and the mind of her generation, was the bridge that brought them across the isolation and humiliation of segregation. >> we're going to leave you with a tune -- >> we were on our way back to america at the time when whe heard about martin luther king. >> tribute to dr. martin luther king. >> it was as though a truck, a

mack truck had drove a hole right through our hearts. all 18 wheels of it. out of that was born "the king of love is dead." ♪ a man of noble birth teaching love and freedom for his fellow man ♪ >> we thank god for giving us the leader who was willing to die, but not willing to kill. >> simone has always been committed to the movement. she expressed the pain that the african-american community felt. she was devastated, angry. >> it's my song. i composed it through anger. >> you don't look like you can be angry at all. >> all the time. >> nina simone was a jazz

musician. she was born in the segregated south. her mississippi goddamn is one of the, if not the most racially critique of the american sockbook. ♪ sal bam a's got me so upset ♪ tennessee got me so upset ♪ everybody knows about mississippi goddamn ♪ >> dr. king will buffer the lives between the black people and white people. the white people's best friend is dead. ♪ ♪ can't you see it, i know you can feel it ♪ ♪ it's all in the air ♪ i can't stand this pressure much longer ♪ ♪ somebody -- >> goddamn in song has a very powerful impact. mississippi goddamn. and she couldn't come up with a better word. got her in trouble.

it was banned. ♪ lord have mercy on this land of mine ♪ ♪ we all going to get it in due time ♪ ♪ i don't belong here ♪ i don't belong there ♪ i even stopped believing in prayer ♪ >> the tune reflects the times and situation in which i find myself. that to me is my beauty. and at this crucial time in our lives, when everything is so desperate, when every day is a matter of survival, i don't think you can help but be involved. ♪ ♪ they're trying to say it's a communist plot ♪ ♪ but all i want is equality for my sister, my brother -- >> race relations have gone to the depths. the country was beginning to explode. i don't know of any other verb to use.

>> in the wake of dr. king's assassination, hundreds of american cities go up in flames, and the national guard and police are under siege just because of that. our militant black rage is literally going to war. ♪ we all going to die ♪ i don't trust nobody anymore ♪ i keep on saying go slow ♪ >> revolution is when somebody says, i've had enough. >> the entire country should have been burning. not just the black ghetto. he wasn't just a hero for black people, he was a hero for all of us. >> we're standing on the tradition of people who fought for our rights. and to know that liberation is not something that is going to be really quick and easy. it's something that's going to take years and years.

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y282sy ywty i was in memphis, tennessee, the year after martin luther king was shot. and we had a march.

and all of a sudden a bomb went off. it was a smoke bomb. and you would expect people would lie down on the ground. i mean, there were thousands of us. nobody moved. we crossed arms, and we started singing. you know, we started singing -- ♪ we shall overcome ♪ we shall overcome >> and just stood there. and that was our shield. that moment was the first awakening in the united states that ordinary human beings could stand together and change the course of history. you cannot imagine what it was like before the civil rights you know, there were times when

there was a lynching virtually once every three days in this country, with no repercussions legally. >> it's very hard to imagine it. but, you know, it takes guts, it takes tremendous courage to say, i will walk in a peaceful demonstration, although i may be shot. i know they may club me. they may turn the dogs on me. it takes tremendous courage. a kind of valor, if you will, which is uncommon. what helped the people who were doing that were singing these songs. >> singing "we shall overcome" was different from just marching around. it was a feeling that this was actually going to happen, that there was something in the harmony of the song that made sense musically. it was only a matter of time before it made sense socially.

>> "we shall overcome" is an old negro spiritual. it's called "i'll overcome. "it was used in the labor movement. it became the theme song. people just accepted it. four of us came together. we sang everywhere. we sang at house parties. we sang at carnegie hall. to take the message of this movement to the north, that dr. king would do sometimes. dr. king was a heck of a preacher, but he wasn't that much of a singer. on picket lines you sang, and in jails you sang. music was the glue that held

everything together. >> in the civil rights movement, it was an integrated movement. african-americans from the south who were influenced in a religious way, and whites from the rest of the country who were supportive of the ideas of the civil rights movement. ♪ >> we were steeped in an understanding that music was part and parcel of the grass roots effort to create a better world. and that platform for music was a platform for advocacy.

>> you can't go in. >> joan baez was important because she showed up in the most difficult places. >> i'd like to try. >> you can't go. >> joan baez was an international star at that point. she was very concerned about civil rights. >> i have a picture of her in renata, mississippi, walking right along behind dr. king and me and a couple others. and we were there because a mob took kindergarten children and threw them through plate glass windows to keep them from getting close to the school. >> if they have to kill me, i'm going.

>> i had one reporter actually tell me, look, i know you don't like the press getting in your way. but i got to keep a camera on martin luther king. because if he gets killed, and i don't get a picture of it, i'll lose my job. >> there were people out there looking to kill. >> we will build a brotherhood overarched by love! >> that kind of courage changed how i viewed human beings. they can do acts of exemplary humanity that has a resonance and rippled through society. that's dr. king. >> this is why i can still sing "we shall overcome.

". >> he used to say the movement was a collection of people, and he included himself, who was certifiably insane. he said nobody in their right mind would think they were going to take on the federal government, and the world, and all of these state courts, and police, and everybody else with no money, no guns, no political power, nothing but an idea in your head and a song in your heart. and he said, you've got to be crazy. to think you're going oh change the world that way. but he was doing it. >> the civil rights movement didn't happen because there was an emancipation proclamation, it happened because the people gave their all. they gave their lives.

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what is your nationality? >> my nationality is african-americ

african-american. >> michael, you have to wait until next week. you can't have it now. are you willing to wait until next week? >> no. >> how are you going oh get your freedom? >> i will use anything necessary to get my freedom. >> any means necessary? >> yes. >> the walls of jim crow started coming down. but in the aftermath of the '60s, the legislation was there, but the application wasn't there. yes, we've got the foundation, but we haven't built anything on the foundation. it was almost like when slavery ended about 100 years before that. okay, y'all are free. you can leave. leave and go where with what and do what? we were free, but not equal. >> what is this moment that we're in, the post-civil rights movement.

the movement of racial equality? when i can still be profiled on the street? music becomes a gateway for african-americans to articulate their hopes, their desires, their longings, their social critiques. ♪ people get ready ♪ there's a train coming ♪ don't need any baggage ♪ you just get onboard ♪ all we need is faith ♪ don't need no ticket ♪ we'll just pay the lord >> aretha called upon this long black musical tradition of gospel fortitude. >> people get ready, there's a train a'coming. people are inspired by the movement of the.

the song sounds like an old spiritual, here's your chance, get onboard. there's a movement taking place. by 1968 when aretha's version comes out, she's got this memorable refrain in the beginning, i believe. it opened this idea that the struggle is not over. there are still major obstacles to be overcome. police brutality, economic inequality. and here's aretha in 1968 singing, i believe that a triumph not only over racial injustice, but economic inequality are possible. and for that reason, it was a very powerful song.

♪ you don't need no baggage ♪ we'll just thank the lord >> she was such a representation of black power. i mean, literally, her voice was an instrument beyond anybody's reckoning. it's one of the greatest voices in american history. >> her ability to travel across racial lines, and to bring an unbridled power, sexuality, but also rage. she became an embodiment of blackness, of a kind of soulfulness that was the essence of our people. >> we are black! our noses are broad!

our lips are thick! our hair is nappy! and we are beautiful! and we are beautiful! we are beautiful! >> the early '60s, you have the hymns of unity and change. once the black power movement comes along, the hymns are replaced and replaced by much more militant assertion. the rhythms, and the sort of starkness. >> the white people who know right and want to do right. but there's so few. if 10,000 rattlesnakes was coming down and i had a door i could shut, and of the 10,000, 1,000 meant right, 1,000 didn't want to bite me, i knew they were good, should i let all these rattlesnakes come down and get together and form a shield? or should i just close the door and stay safe? >> you couldn't see people that had big fros saying we shall overcome. it just seemed incongruent.

>> there was a sense of identity through style. and music. james brown. and the feeling, of course, of pride. >> i must have been 5 years old, and my aunt bought me a t-shirt. it an image of james brown with an afro. i loved that t-shirt. i remember i used to rub my hand over james brown's image. >> james brown was unapologetically black. and made i this is the first time that we saw white america wanting to be us. real blacks. >> with james brown it was always about articulating blackness lyrically, but also sounding it out.

♪ we do things for ourselves >> james brown is an assertively black idiom with an assertively black message, say it loud, i'm black and i'm proud. almost anybody could sing that and believe it. >> proud, keep your head up high and do what you got to do, as a people. >> james brown had a very self-consciously bootstrapping kind of individual motion of what it meant to be black in america. a man can't accomplish anything if he isn't proud of who he is.

plenty had changed in america by virtue of the civil

rights movement. the beginning of the integration of schools. you have the election of black elected officials. >> when we get black voters voting in large numbers, we'll have a politician elected that will represent all the people. and when politicians represent all the people, we'll have a new hope in america. >> you have the opportunity for african-american artists to reach the highest success. you have opportunities for companies like barry gordy's motown to become one of the preeminent american success stories of that period. ♪ >> the '70s were a time for black music. the black album market is really introduced. and you have marvin, you have isaac, barry white. it's an amazing period.

and stevie was coming of age at the right time. ♪ >> one of the responses to civil rights is the industrialization. stevie wonder catalogs the six degrees of segregation. surrounded by walls that aren't so pretty. >> after the civil rights movement, here we are in the valley, drugs had come in. dysfunctional communities. and the music reflected that. ♪ >> it's poetry, but it's also

summing up social, economic issues that define urban black america. it's about survival, living just enough, just enough for the city. >> the problem with motown is i came to it when i was 9 years old, so not only did they consider me an artist, about you they almost considered me as a child. i experienced new, beautiful things that would cause me to write a certain way. >> stevie is very politically conscious. stevie is a man who wants the world to be better. we all want the world to be better. but stevie, he lives it. >> congress was urged today to make the birthday of martin luther king to be a national holiday. >> dr. king did not speak for all black people and all hispanics. he spoke the truth which represented every living

american member of the melting pot. >> we need to memorialize the break-throughs that the civil rights movement had achieved, pushing us towards a more diverse society and a more just society. >> greatness has been proven by this man. i urge my colleagues, give martin luther king his day. >> senator helms insisted there should be no holiday for dr. king. >> he attacked this country in the most vicious way. >> i went to d.c. with stevie, did the big rally out in front of the capitol building. >> it was here, that dr. martin luther king inspired the entire nation. >> the representation of can we take the civil rights movement

and make a monument to it. >> as an artist, my purpose is to communicate a message that can better improve the lives of all of us. >> stevie wonder really led this fight to make sure that a person of color could have a day that we can all come together and really reckon with the legacies of this man who transformed modern life. ♪ >> he figured out a way to write a new happy birthday song, which is brilliant in that people can sing along. and a lot of people has no idea that it was about martin luther king's birthday in any way, shape or form. >> it's one of our most important kind of songs that does the kind of political work, even when you're not thinking about it. >> i do not believe with ewould

have ever had dr. king holiday if stevie wonder had done that song. i told him later, you sang that song into legislation. >> growing up and learning about the holiday and learning about what he sacrificed. first of all, you're grateful for the people who give up their lives for the simple liberties that i have today. but it means everything, you know. i think it shows us how far we have come. but also, how far we still have to go. >> you know, the unity of all people -- dear predictable, there's no other way to say this. it's over. i've found a permanent escape from monotony. together, we are perfectly balanced, our senses awake, our hearts racing as one. i know this is sudden,

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in the '80s, american abandoned inner cities. >> everybody was moving out of their homes. you get a lot of social flack. to me i called it engineered anarchy in chaos. >> civil rights felt like it had

been abandoned. >> i'm trying to tell you -- >> the civil rights movement that we saw in the south and never really dealt with, the latent racism in the north. so when we started seeing killings in new york, we used some of the tactics in the south, marching and all. but it was in an urban context. and it was in our style. so we were a lot more defiant. though we were nonviolent. but we were more in your face, because we were in new york. >> 1989, america's racial contradictions are coming home. on the one hand, this is the peak of school desegregation. and then on the other hand, there's a rise of hate violence. and into this cauldron of racial

tension, there was a release of the power. >> public enemy, the young black male situation in america, we feel we're all public enemies. we have a logo that has a cross. we feel that represents ourselves, and anybody in our situation. >> public enemy had already been the most political rap group, at the time and still probably the black group ever. they were taking from black oppositional politics that was different from the mainstream wronz. nobody really had the -- to consistently use that as a base of operation.

it's a musical practice. but i always thought of it as a way of recognizing musical history. so one way to look at public enemy and fight the power as though they're speaking with the ancestors, james brown, and through sampling, they're bringing the ancestors to a new generation of african-americans. >> so here was this group in 1989 at a moment where african-americans are under assault again. saying, we've got the blueprint for how to fight this. and this blueprint is what happened in the '50s and 1960s. you've fought to fight power. we've got to stand up. we've got to present our bodies. >> part of the black freedom struggle has always been about thinking of this larger kind of redemption that was waiting for us. that we need to be ready, that we need to be prepared, and that we also need to make that change.

>> every time change has come, it's not because a particularing leader created all that change. what's happened is that a movement began, of people saying we want a change. and a leader says, you know what, if i can walk with you, if i can march with you, if i can work with you, if i can be alongside you, i want to help, i want to roll up my sleeves, i want to make a change! i just want to be a part of creating a better america! ♪ i was born by the river ♪ in a little church ♪ and just like the river i've been arunning ever since ♪ ♪ it's been a long

♪ ♪ a long time coming ♪ but i know a change going to come ♪ ♪ oh, yes, it will ♪ it's been too hard living -- >> barack obama walks out with his family. and he starts speaking. >> put their hands on the arc of history, and bend it once more towards the hope of a better day. it's been a long time coming. but tonight, because of what we did on this date, in this election, at this defining moment, change has come to america. >> and what he said, change has come to america, i thought about how my mother played that little 45 record at home, sam cook. ♪ somebody keeps telling me --

>> the arc of history is bending towards moral justice in that song. the desire it turned a desire for racial justice into a love song to remind us the future tells us something different as long as we can harness it. >> we shall overcome. yes, we can. >> it was emotional first of all. but what i think got me is when i looked at my father. when i looked at my grandmother, she was completely broken. she's been alive almost 100 years, she's seen a lot. to have her be able to witness him being elected into office. i mean, that was -- it gives me goose bumps thinking about it now.

>> i was so proud. i was proud of america. black people didn't elect barack obama. america elected him. were it not for all the races of people in america who voted for him -- >> maybe we crossed the threshold. and there's a lot of exuberance, maybe an irrational exuberance, that we had overcome. ♪ whether you're after supreme performance... ...advanced intelligence...

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♪ ♪

i became involved in the black lives matter movement on august 9th, 2014 when mike brown was brutally killed by darren wilson in ferguson, missouri. we knew that every 20 hours a black person was killed by police officers or vigilante. >> tray -- >> von. >> black lives matter. >> we really had to rely on ourselv

ourselves. >> jesse jackson came to ferguson and we marched to one particular church. i think he tried to have us sing "we shall overcome." >> that's not where these kids are coming from. they're not going to question church like that, they don't have the same tradition. >> the song doesn't tell us when we shall overcome. it says we will overcome some day. what we in the streets wanted, we wanted justice now. ♪ ♪ >> we're going to be all right.

>> there's a spirit u ailty that resonates through that song. ♪ >> it's about seeking collectivity. it's a leap of faith. >> it's multiple messages. you're going to be all right, we're going to get through this day, and we're going to be here tomorrow, and we're going to fight to save our nation, and fight to save ourselves. >> it also is like, we're right. this is a morally righteous cause. ♪ >> there's a funny story of the civil rights era woman, who writes for the washington post. was given the record to listen to. hated the kendrick lamar. hated it, found it foul and

disgusting. >> he's meant to get on your nerves with new stuff. and they will do it, they don't want their grandmom or mom or older brother's sound. kendrick lamar came in and talked about everything. it's the best record he had. ♪ [ gunfire ] >> i remember you was conflicted. sometimes i did the same. >> there's a hip-hop coolness swagger, as a kind of weapon, as a kind of tool to fight every day battles. it's about the message of an inner voice, what's happening right now. is ex-kruv yating.

but big picture, we gonna be all right. >> when it seems like there is no hope at all. music can provide that hope, it transports you. freedom is possible for african-american people in a way that was being denied to them in the political present. >> i think martin luther king's legacy, the legacy we should really take to heart is that america as a country, although it has great promise has not reached its potential yet. it's still a work in progress, and the country in many ways needs to be radically reconstructed to include all of these different voices and people who make up the fabric of what this country actually is.

it's amazing, so many decades later, these are still the same questions that we're asking. >> if we really want to honor martin luther king's brilliant legacy today. i think we have to try to enact what he was trying to do and make it a reality, rather than just a dream. what's wrong with this picture? this is cnn tonight. i'm don lemon. sarah palin with her own rogue's gallery of kid rock and ted nugent in front of a white house portrait of hillary clinton. is she throwing shade at the former first lady? president trump says he's closer than ever to a plan to repeal and replace obama care. maybe just days away. is the obama